Page 51 of Spooked

Mr. Vale’s eyes widened. He clearly hadn’t been expecting this.

“That won’t be necessary, Carissa,” he said.

“Oh, don’t be silly. You both have to eat. I’ll make reservations at Le Jardin for eight o’clock. Sophie can join us too.”

“I think we were planning to work late,” I tried.

“Don’t let this slave driver push you around.” She elbowed Mr. Vale in the side, and he glared at her. “There’s a dress code. Wear something nice.” Carissa turned on her heel and gave a little finger wave as she headed for the door. “See you later.”

Mr. Vale sagged against the dirty wall and groaned. “It’s fine. We just won’t go. And don’t ask why I married her, because right now, I couldn’t tell you. I didn’t even do drugs in college.”

A clatter came from the hallway outside.

“Will someone move this damn bucket!”

“Sorry, Ms. Dunn.”

Oops.

“If we don’t go, won’t she think we have something to hide?”

“Probably. But I’m not putting you through that.”

“Who’s Sophie?”

“Her assistant.”

I didn’t want to go, not remotely, but I also hated the thought of putting the spotlight on myself through our absence. And although I couldn’t tell Mr. Vale, I’d dealt with a hundred Carissa Dunns back in Massachusetts. Every one of my father’s friends seemed to be married to either a gold-digging bitch or a meek little clone of my mother. There was no in-between. Some of the women were only a few years older than me, and they didn’t much care for a girl who went to Harvard. Meera said they felt threatened.

“I know it might not always seem like it, but I’m stronger than I look.”

Carissa, I could cope with; it was Mr. Vale who left me off kilter.

“I’m beginning to realise that.”

“So we’ll go to Le Jardin and prove I’m nothing but a PA. That the prenup won’t be broken by me. I took this job for the steady paycheck, not sexual favours from the boss.”

“Am I allowed to be disappointed by that?”

I laughed at the joke.

Mr. Vale didn’t.

My phone buzzed in my pocket, and I checked the messages. “The construction crew just arrived. Let’s start work.”

CHAPTER20

BRAX

What the hell was Carissa playing at?

Actually, scratch that question. Brax knew exactly what she was doing. She wanted to get close to Meera, close enough to assess the likelihood of Brax slipping up and breaching the prenup. She’d played this game twice before, with assistants number eight and seventeen, both of whom had been young, blonde, and beautiful, everything Carissa felt threatened by. Number eight had been dumb as a box of dildos, vapid enough that Carissa eliminated her as a prospective fuck buddy for her husband. She knew Brax got turned off by stupidity. As for seventeen, Carissa had made a proposal, the girl had accepted, and Brax had fired her the next day. Thank goodness his investigator had overheard the conversation.

But Meera wasn’t blonde, and based on his history, not Brax’s type at all. So why this dinner? What did Carissa know?

The question preyed on his mind the whole day.

Le Jardin des Délices Terrestres, known colloquially as Le Jardin, was an esoteric vegetarian French restaurant—an oxymoron if there ever was one—and Carissa’s current favourite if her credit card statement was any indication. She’d stopped eating meat five years ago, or six if one didn’t count the last time she’d sucked cock.

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